safety first

[spooler]

ok, here comes the confession, since many of us are not Professional Operator's I have decided to share this little tale of luck and horror.
I am to mean and cheap to have any friends.
Thus I work alone all the time..This day I was logging, yarding tree's from around our mt. top...I was eyeing a large birch tree about 30' over the side of the Mt. I ran 40' of chain over the edge and hooked on. My chain is in 10' lengths. so I had all my hooks just so and wanted to tighten them up. Standing on the ground I reached in and was going to curl my bucket on my 420c/90 loader. This was a bad idea, as I bumped the raise lever..just a inch...and LOOK OUT! She took off down the Mt.
It was 400 ft. to the bottom and I didnt want to lose my only friend, my 420c...so I jumped up on the tracks to reach the brakes...BIG MISTAKE!
I was now on a conveyor going down a Mt. cliff..I was past the exhaust before I knew it!..I began running up the track, to reach a brake...tough to do when each step is cut in half from the moving track. I made headway and piled into the cab hitting every brake I could find..Now I am crippled up in the cab holding steering brakes and foot brakes..bruised and bleeding from the dive into the cab..nothing critical..I was staring straight down ..I dont know the grade..but it is steep enough to be tough to climb...In the 5 seconds it took this all to happen , I sweated more than I have in a full year!..I gingerly backed up to the edge and turned off the crawler for the day...My Operating Engineer buddy told me" It is written in stone that you NEVER operate unless your in the seat." I have this clear in my mind now and I hope you guys are much smarter than me..He added that he had heard this story before..except that the fool running on the tracks was either maimed or dead...I was very lucky...Sinners and Fools, Thank God He looks after them, cuz I are one!
Beware friends, these crawlers are small and easy to reach the controls from the ground, DON'T YOU DO IT!

Safety First,
Chuck

[JD40c]

Well said! I don't care how experienced you are, moving levers out of the cab seems to make them do the opposite of what you'd think they should do. At least it has in the couple times I foolishly tried to move the blade or inch a hydro transmission "just a little bit".

[Lavoy]

It is kind like starting them from the ground. A guy near Randy went up behind his 420 w/90 loader and started it standing behind the seat. It was in reverser, started right away, and backed over him, guess who won?
lavoy

[bitcoder]

Chuck's story of what we will do to keep our "friends" reminds me of my 1010C catching fire, it had been leaking a little diesel under the tank somewhere which I kept ignoring until somehow an electrical short got going and hot wires started cooking the caked on dirt and diesel... All this was happening in the shop with lots of tools and other valuable vehicles and equipment but of course no fire extinguiser... By the time I got done ripping out wiring I had medium rare palms and fingers... I agree with safety first and now have good sized class ABC fire extinguisher in the shop and have practiced using it.